Inception

Intro

1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.

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• catch
• tie together
• caper
• cerebral

• blockbuster
• action-packed
• twists and turns
• follow

• storyline
• surreal

2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

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Most summer blockbusters are action-packed and fun to watch. But it’s unusual to find one that is also intelligent and interesting. Inception may be that rare gem, an action movie with brains.

Inception is a science fiction movie. It stars Leonardo DiCaprio as a thief who is able to enter people’s dreams. The plot features a lot of twists and turns. Find out if Mason and Devan were able to follow them.

Dialog

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2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Devan

Mason

Devan:  So, I just saw Inception and it’s the kind of movie where I feel like I need to go see it like at least 3 more times because there’s so many things I missed and so many dots that I need to connect, you know.

Mason:  Yeah, absolutely, I mean, I really loved this whole idea of like being able to interact within someone’s dream and like multiple layers, dreams within dreams, and that, you know, things kind of changed and got more surreal the deeper you went. That was kind of cool.

Devan:  Yeah, it was really interesting and I was actually worried that I wouldn’t be able to follow it that well, based on the reviews that I read where they were like “It’s a dream within a dream within a dream.” But I feel like I did follow it pretty well, but there were just so many small details that I feel like in order to be able to catch everything and tie everything together, you can’t just see it once, you know.

Mason:  Yeah. And I mean I think the reason you’re able to follow it is because it’s like a crime caper. It’s a spy movie where…I was actually thinking of the original Thomas Crowne Affair where it’s like a guy who’s gotta assemble his crew to pull off the big job, and it has all of those elements, right? But then it’s got this weird cerebral thing going on on top of it.

Devan:  Yeah definitely. It had all the special effects and the storyline that was of a typical Hollywood blockbuster, but then at the same time it had this whole other level that was much more intellectual than a typical blockbuster, you know.

Grammar Point

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Quizzes

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Lesson MP3

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